


Blood Honor

by devilinthedetails



Category: PIERCE Tamora - Works, Tortall - Tamora Pierce
Genre: Bazhir, Canon-Typical Racism, Fencing, Gen, Honor, Knight & Squire, Politics, Prejudice, tournament
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-01
Updated: 2018-09-01
Packaged: 2019-07-05 12:14:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15863409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/devilinthedetails/pseuds/devilinthedetails
Summary: Zahir defends his king's honor. Set during the Great Progress in Squire.





	Blood Honor

Blood Honor

“You’re the king’s pet savage who’ll gladly bite off the hand that feeds you, aren’t you?” A knight, reeking of arrogance as much as ale, snaked out an arm to snatch hold of Zahir’s shoulder as Zahir hurried down a thronging corridor in Naxen castle, intent on delivering a letter from King Jonathan to Sir Gareth. The king had only finished meeting with the Prime Minister a bell ago but a stray notion had occurred to him, at which point he was compelled to scrawl it down, sending it off with Zahir. 

For all his snide internal observations, Zahir didn’t particularly mind running messages for his knightmaster—it was a squire’s duty, after all, and it strengthened his legs to trot about as Lord Wyldon would have pointed out if Zahir was foolish enough to give him half an opening—if doing so hadn’t brought him face-to-face with a nasty knight whose breath bore a smell of alcohol powerful enough to intoxicate Zahir. 

“I’m the king’s squire, yes.” Zahir twisted out of the knight’s unpleasantly tight grip before it could bruise him, wrinkling his nose disdainfully at the stench of ale, a disgusting drink no Bazhir as traditional as himself would ever stoop to indulge him, clinging to the knight’s rumpled clothes. Used to being referred to as a savage and worse by the northerners who had oppressed his people and stolen their land for centuries, Zahir sketched a slight, mocking bow. “I’m in his service as are we all, good sir.” 

“You sand scuts serve only yourselves as you corrupt our king with barbaric blood magic.” Spittle flew from the knight’s foaming mouth onto Zahir’s cheeks but he refused to lower himself by swiping it off with his sleeve. Instead he stared at the knight with searing contempt that seemed to spur on the seething. “You poison him into believing that ruining our country beyond recognition is progress. I spit on you as I do the king.” 

So saying, the knight hacked up a ball of phlegm and hurled it into Zahir’s face. Zahir’s blood boiled and scarlet tinged the edges of his vision. An insult to himself he could ignore—sometimes ignoring an insult from a northerner, implying the vicious words were beneath even his scorn could could infuriate them more than his most biting comments—but a squire dishonored himself and his knightmaster if he allowed any calumny against the knight he served to go unchallenged just as a subject who heard disloyalty to his king and didn’t punish it disgraced himself and the kingdom. Skeptical that change was an improvement rather than a regression, Zahir might have agreed with conservatives that some of his knightmaster’s progressive ideas courted disaster but he could never tolerate such blatant disrespect for the king who ruled them all—Bazhir and northerner, progressive and conservative, alike. 

“You insult the king and border on treason.” Zahir’s right hand clenched into a fist over his scabbard. “I challenge you in the lists.” 

“We clash with swords tomorrow.” The knight eyed Zahir’s slender frame derisively, as the challenged it was his right to name the weapon with which they fought, and Zahir smirked, glad the knight was too impaired by alcohol to realize that Zahir’s nimbleness and swift reflexes marked a deft fencer. Zahir might have been trained in archery and riding since before he could walk as befitted a proud Bazhir warrior but that didn’t mean that after many years in the north he was unschooled with a sword. “I’ll insult the king’s honor and yours again when I beat you before the entire tournament. He never should’ve sullied himself with such a scrawny sand scut squire.” 

The next day, as their swords tangled in front of a cheering and jeering audience that provided encouragement and taunting in equal measure that Zahir sought to tune out as a distraction, Zahir was grimly satisfied to discover the alcohol still impeded the knight with whom he dueled. His foe’s strikes were an eye blink slow—indicative of a mind still muddled by ale—and when Zahir parried his blocks were delayed and frantic. 

Seizing the chance to not only defeat but utterly humiliate his enemy, Zahir pressed forward, his sword as fierce and fast a force of nature as lightning, until his opponent’s floundering footwork as he retreated too hastily sprawled him into a mud puddle. 

Vindication surged through him, he jeered triumphantly down at the knight who had insulted him, the Bazhir, and finally and most unforgivably, the king Zahir served. He slid the cold steel of his blade under the knight’s heaving chin and watched his enemy struggle to control his breathing for fear of being cut. “Next time you insult His Majesty he might take your head for treason. Consider this your only warning, and count it a mercy that you’re getting any warning at all.” 

“I’ll apologize to His Majesty.” The stink radiating from the knight like heat from sunbaked sand suggested that he had soiled himself with more than mud. Zahir was duly grateful to all the gods not to be the unfortunate squire responsible for cleaning the brown stains from this cowardly knight’s armor and undergarments. 

“You won’t waste His Majesty’s precious time with your pitiful apologies.” Zahir withdrew his sword from the knight’s throat at least, deaf to the applause from those who had supported the king’s squire and to the boos from those who regarded it as a disgrace for a Bazhir to thrash a northerner into submission. “He doesn’t know your name, and you won’t trouble him enough that he has to learn it. You’ll remain as inconsequential to him as you are now.” 

Confident that he had put his opponent in his place, Zahir spun on his heel and strode away. He hoped not to receive any attention or adoration for his defeat of the false knight who dared to insult his king, but as he polished his sword in the bedroom he’d been assigned, Vania wedged herself against him. She hugged him with one arm while the other offered him a cup of water. 

“You’re a hero, Zahir.” Vania beamed at Zahir as he gulped at the water only now noticing how thirsty he was and how the mint mixed into the water drove the memory of alcohol-tainted breath from his nostrils. The scent of mint rejuvenated him body and soul, not that he planned on sharing that restored strength that hinted at earlier weakness to a princess of the realm. “You beat the knight you challenged in the lists.” 

“You think that makes me a hero?” Zahir scoffed. “Beating a knight in the lists?” 

“He must have done something downright dastardly for you to challenge him.” Vania’s smile remained undimmed despite his dismissive snort. “That’s what makes you a hero—standing up to the wicked.” 

“Vania is right.” King Jonathan appeared in the doorway, and Zahir would have bowed if Vania weren’t wrapped around him. “I’m proud of how well you fought today, squire.” 

“It was only my duty, sire.” Zahir’s cheeks flamed. As much as he craved his knightmaster’s approval, it never failed to embarrass him when he received a compliment from his king. “As Your Majesty’s faithful subject and squire, I had to defend your honor when it was in question.” 

“He questioned my honor?” King Jonathan’s forehead furrowed. Gaze flicking to Vania, he added, “I thought he would’ve insulted you with a term for the Bazhir I won’t repeat.” 

“Oh, he did that, but I hear the term often enough not to dignify it with a challenge.” Zahir thought the king must be naive—enraptured in his progressive fantasy of creating a realm whose diverse peoples could embrace with open arms despite centuries of hostility bred into their blood and bones—to believe that Zahir didn’t hear sand scut thrown in his face like scalding oil whenever anything from his actions to his mere existence offended a northerner. “It was his insult to your honor that demanded I challenge him, Your Majesty.”

“You’ve defended my honor very well then.” King Jonathan stepped into the room to ruffle Zahir’s sweat-soaked hair. 

“Against a drunkard knight.” Zahir’s lips twitched wryly. “That’s nothing, sire.” 

“One day I foresee that you’ll defend my honor against more than drunkard knights.” King Jonathan’s eyes twinkled like blue stars. “That’s far more than nothing, Zahir ibn Alhaz.”


End file.
